The ‘Top Cities of the Middle East’ survey, recently conducted by Bayt.com, the region’s number one job site and YouGov, the international research and consulting organisation, has identified the top cities in the Middle East in terms of several wide-ranging factors – from economic to environmental – that affect residents’ life.
According to the survey’s respondents, the top five cities in the Arab world to live in are, in order: Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Manama, and Muscat. The survey factored in economic factors, entrepreneurial factors, labour rights, environmental factors, everyday life, socio-cultural factors, and quality of life.
Economic Factors
Job availability across the region is considered to be ‘average’ in most cities. Riyadh is considered to have the highest possibility of employment with49% stating that the availability of jobs is either ‘good’ or ‘excellent’. Doha comes second with49%, followed by Jeddah (38%), Abu Dhabi (37%) and Dubai (34%). The city considered to have the lowest employment opportunities is Beirut.
Doha is considered to have the most competitive salaries according to44% of respondents, though Abu Dhabi follows closely behind with41%. Other cities offering compensation that is considered to be high are Riyadh (40%), Dubai (38%) and Sharjah (30%). On the other end of the spectrum Damascus and Amman are considered to offer the lowest salaries, with68% respondents for each voting bad/poor.
The most affordable housing can be found in Sharjah, with47% of its residents claiming residential costs are ‘good’ or ‘excellent’. This is followed by Manama with44%, and Muscat with34%, while Damascus comes in last with76% stating that the housing price situation is either ‘bad’ or ‘poor’. Beirut and Algiers come in close behind with74% and73%, respectively.
Four out of ten respondents (42%) in Manama state that it is it is excellent in terms of affordability in terms of cost of living. Riyadh and Sharjah, with30% and29% respectively, are also considered to be affordable, whereas Amman and Beirut are seen to be the most expensive by its residents. Manama also comes out top in terms of affordable utilities, followed by KuwaitCity and Riyadh; Beirut and Amman rank lowest.
Entrepreneurship Factors
Would-be entrepreneurs of Sharjah (43%)and Dubai (40%) rate their cities highly in terms of ‘ease of starting up new businesses’. On the other end only18% those from Damascus state that it’s easy to start a new business in Damascus, making it one of the most challenging city.
Cities in the UAE, are rated highly by their residents for their ‘lack of bureaucracy in procedures and paperwork; Dubai receives highest ratingwith four out of ten respondents, followed closely by Abu Dhabi and Sharjah, each with38%.
The survey shows that finding finances to start a new business is difficult in general across the region, though it is seen as being easy to find funding in Abu Dhabi, according to40%. New businesses starting up in Damascus, Aleppo, Amman and Cairo will have the most difficulties securing financial support.
When it comes to new ideas and innovation,56% of respondents state that Dubai is most receptive, followed by Sharjah (52%), while those cities most opposed to rocking the boat are Rabat, Amman (both with48%), and Marrakech (43%) where reception of new ideas is bad/poor according to residents.
Labour Rights
End of service benefits are seen as being highest in GCC cities, especially in Sharjah (44%), Abu Dhabi (42%), Manama (42%) and KuwaitCity (41%). Abu Dhabi and Manama also rank highest in terms of employee satisfaction withtermination rights, with41% each. Employees in Beirut believe they are worst off with66% stating that their end of service benefits are either ‘bad’ or ‘poor’, and64% claiming their termination rights are just as bad.
Manama , according to53%,is good/ excellentin terms of their vacation allowances. Also, respondents in Muscat, Abu Dhabi and Kuwait City also ranked their allotted annual leave days highly. The statistics show least ratingsreceived by Cairo (only18%).
Beirut receives extremely negative ratings with73% stating their level of wage protection is ‘bad’ or ‘poor’. Cities in the UAE, particularly Abu Dhabi (44%), rated positively with regards to the wage protection system. Ithas also scored highlyin terms of ‘provision for health insurance’, followed by Riyadh and Jeddah.
Environmental Factors
The city with the least perceived air pollution is Muscat according to70% of the city’s residents, while Abu Dhabi ranked second with61%. Dubai and Sharjah earned54% and52%, respectively, while the cities voted with the cleanest water are Muscat, Abu Dhabi, and Dubai.
Abu Dhabi and Dubai are both tied with91% of respondents each claiming that their city has the cleanest roads and streets, followed by Muscat with81%.
Almost three quarters (71%)of Muscat-based respondents believe their city have low levels of noise pollution, with Abu Dhabi coming in second (64%), Dubai third (56%)and Sharjah a close fourth (55%).
Residents of Abu Dhabi voted their city as good/ excellent in terms of having greenery (68%), closely followed by Muscat where67% of respondents also claim that their city has substantial green areas.
Cairo scored lowest across the board, with seven out of ten (68%) of Cairo residents claiming that their city has the least clean roadways;74% of residents stating it as having the most polluted air;65% stating that the level of water pollution is ‘bad’ or ‘poor’;72% stating that noise pollution levels are high; and58% stating that there are few green areas in the city.
Muscat and Abu Dhabi both rated consistently high throughout this section of the survey, suggesting the Omani and UAE capitals may be the best cities in the region in terms of the environment.
Everyday Life
Abu Dhabi receives highest ratings in terms of availability of quality healthcare facilities with seven out of ten residents (70%) rating the available health care facilities as ‘good’ or ‘excellent’. Manama ranks second (65%) in terms of availability of medical facilities, and the respondents from Bahrain’s capital rank the quality of health-care higher than that available elsewhere.
Abu Dhabi and Dubai claim the top two spots for good/excellent availability of public utilities (84% and82% respectively), as well as for good/excellent accessibility of their public transportation systems (77% for Dubai and70% for Abu Dhabi) – the quality of which is considered to be predominantly ‘excellent’.
Traffic congestion is lowest in Abu Dhabi and Manama, according to42% and40% of respondents respectively, while Cairo’s roads are thought to be busiest. Pedestrian walkways/footpaths are provided for most in Abu Dhabi, Dubai and Sharjah, and least in Cairo.
Entertainment venues are most plentiful in Dubai, according to85% of survey respondents, followed by Abu Dhabi, Beirut (both at73%) and Manama (72%).
The majority of Beirut residents (71%) state that the availability of educational facilities in their city is high; they also claim that the quality of education is high, with statistics ranking it the highest in the region. Educational options and the quality thereof in Sharjah comes second, followed by Dubai – though Abu Dhabi residents rank their scholastic facilities as being of higher quality than the latter.
Access to convenience stores are most easy in Dubai, according to84% of respondents; Abu Dhabi and Sharjah follow closely with82% each, Manama comes third with77%, and Alexandria and Amman fourth with76% each.
Social-Cultural Factors
Residents of Tunis have rated their city very highly (63%- good/ excellent) on equality amongst genders. Levels of equality are also perceived to be high in Muscat (60%) and Manama (55%).
The residents of Aleppo (73%) believe that their society is fair to all nationalities, this being highest in the region. Also Tunis, Manama and Marrakech respondents also state a high level of acceptance. On the other hand, Kuwait City is seen as having the least fair treatment of all nationalities (according to66% of respondents), followed by Riyadh (64%) and Jeddah (61%) – which are seenless tolerantby its residents. For those cities that do embrace multicultural societies, Muscat comes top with73% of respondents stating tolerance is ‘good’ or ‘excellent’; Marrakech and Abu Dhabi both garnered69% each, followed by Dubai and Rabat (both with67%).
Cities in the UAE are believed to have the most effective law enforcement, with79% of Abu Dhabi respondents stating that law enforcement in their city is ‘good’ or ‘excellent’. Sharjah follows with76%, with75% of Dubai respondents claiming the same. Hand in hand with this, Abu Dhabi is also seen to have the lowest crime rates (81% state that low crime rates are ‘good’ or ‘excellent’);75% of Dubai respondents and70% of Sharjah respondents feel the same. In Doha, however, crime rates are considered low by78% of respondents.
Overall Quality of Life
The residents of Dubai claim to have a high quality of life, with73% ranking their lifestyle as either ‘good’ or ‘excellent’, while Abu Dhabi’s residents ranked it second with70%. People are most dissatisfied with the quality of life in Beirut and Damascus, though Algiers comes a close third.
When asked if they would like to move to another city, the highest positive response came from Algiers, with77% looking to leave, followed by Casablanca with73%, and Tunis with71%. The majority of residents across the region who expressed a desire to relocate would prefer to move to another city in a different region – except in the case of Abu Dhabi (where majority would prefer to move to a different city within UAE itself). Abu Dhabi also has the second lowest rate of residents wanting to relocate (43%), coming second to Dubai (33%), among those52% would prefer to move to a different city within the UAE itself.
Data for the Bayt.com ‘Top Cities of the Middle East’ poll was collected online from June24 – July42012, with9,038 respondents covering more than12 countries in the MENA region. The results depicted above are based on a sample size of6013, which is formed by the respondents of all the major cities in the region.